these are not flowers
by with the monsters
Summary: Moments in time. Drabbles about the Next Generation, both gentle and savage. Most recent: Lucy&Molly sister drabble.
1. lucyteddy

These drabbles are written in response to prompts over at the Next Gen Fanatics forum (come check us out!).

Many are set in the overarching universe I'm working on at the moment. These will all have "too many war wounds" as a subtitle, so you know they're part of that. The characters aren't necessarily paired together in my headcanon, but their personalities/ages/sorting/etc are the same as in that universe.

If they're standalone (i.e. kids sorted differently, different ages, different personalities) then they'll have "standalone" as a subtitle.

Feel free to leave requests in reviews or PMs (especially family bonding ones!) and I'll try to get to them as quickly as possible.

* * *

 **lucy/teddy, cheap wine, set by** _ **semiotics**_  
too many war wounds

* * *

"I'm just _saying_ ," says Lucy, leaning into Teddy, "like, statistically, they're out there. They have to be. The odds are so big that there's no way they're _not_ out there."

She is drunk. This is okay, because Teddy is also drunk.

"Yeah, but, what's the point in them being out there if we never get to meet them? Aliens are no fun if they're ten billion light years away." He maybe slurs some of the words together, but that's alright. Lucy has always got the gist, with him.

"I'm going to make it happen." Her eyes are wide and earnest, her hands tight around the box of wine in her lap. "M'gonna go to university. Proper university. In America. Then m'gonna invent it. Space travel. Fast space travel. At NASA or SpaceX or summin'."

Teddy picks up the box of wine and tilts the nozzle towards his face. Lucy is still holding onto it, though she probably doesn't realise.

"Expensive," he points out, then turns the little plastic tap and opens his mouth for the wine to arrive. Easiest way of drinking _ever_ , ten points to Hufflepuff.

The wine stops. Teddy opens his eyes in horror and finds that Lucy has turned the tap off.

" _Wine_ ," he demands, but she pulls the box away. Before Teddy knows it the box is out of reach and Lucy has climbed into his lap and grabbed hold of his face and is staring at him very, very seriously.

"You should come. America. I'm gonna go to MIT or Harvard or whatever and then I'm going to work at NASA and you're going to come. You can do art there. Lots to paint in America."

Teddy likes the sound of that. There is, however, a tiny problem.

"We're not old enough to drink in America."

Lucy takes a few seconds to process the enormity of this horror. Then her entire body crumples inwards and she flops over Teddy, all her limbs draped over him in despair.

"Fuck America," she groans into his shoulder. "Cambridge it is. Then the UK's first space agency. Then the universe."

"Promise?"

Lucy lifts her head and smiles, her breath hot with cheap wine. "Promise."


	2. jamesleonora

**james/daughter of daphne greengrass, lemon trees, set by lydiamaartin**  
too many war wounds

* * *

She _fascinates_ James. Not in, like, a beautiful or sexy way or whatever, though that's a given. She's just so _mean_.

She's on the sofa at Uncle Ron's new place, hair spread out like fire over the cushions, an Xbox controller resting on her stomach and her head pillowed in Rose's lap.

"Hey, James." Rose at least has the manners to greet him when he walks in the door. Lo steals one short look and then turns away with a huff of disinterest. Amazing that half-sisters can be so utterly different.

"Nice to see you both too," says James, parking himself in an armchair. "Always a pleasure, Greengrass."

"Fuck off, Potter."

"Testy," says James, and lolls back in his chair. Whatever game she's playing, she's disturbingly good at it. He watches in unconcealed admiration as her character scales a lemon tree, sights down the barrel of her gun, and picks off four enemy players in rapid succession.

"Remind me never to piss you off."

"Too late," she replies, not looking away from the screen. "Didn't I tell you to fuck off?"

"Yeah."

"And you're still here."

James shrugs. It's a good shrug. A helpless, _what's-a-guy-to-do_ shrug. Lo's expression suggests she knows exactly what he could do.

"Jeez," he says, mostly just impressed in the face of the Expression, "how the hell did someone as harmless as Uncle Ron produce you?"

"It's the cheating." Lo's voice is airy and just a little bit proud. "I mean, he and Rose's mum were on a break, whatever. But it messed me up. That or, you know, the fact that my mother is my _mother_."

"To be fair, your mother is terrifying."

"You shut the fuck up about my mother."

"You said it first!"

"For God's sake," explodes Rose, suddenly enough to make Lo pause her game, "I've already had, like, six visions of you two getting off. Either get on with it or stop bickering all the time."

"Gross," says Lo at the same time that James goes, "No!"

But, James thinks...if it's in one of Rose's visions, then it must just be a matter of time. And from the tiny little smile lifting Lo's lips, she might not be so distressed by that idea either.


	3. jameslysander

**james/lysander, wishful thinking, _set by currents_**  
standalone

* * *

It's the steady curve of his shoulder. The baseline of his pulse. The fact of his breathing. All the hardy heat of him, flickering in and out James' vision like stars.

They learned the word asymptote when they took Muggle mathematics to sixth year. Five of them in a dusty classroom, Lysander flopped out over his desk and James watching as the teacher drew lines and curves on the board. Asymptote. A line that can only meet the curve at infinity. From the Ancient Greek ἀσύμπτωτος, to mean _not falling together_.

Lysander only kept on with maths because they threatened to expel him if he didn't pick some subject other than Care Of, and James only kept on with maths because Lysander kept on. Wishful thinking drawing him in.

James likes maths now, though. He wouldn't have words for whatever this is without it. (This: James' fingers reaching for but not touching the single dark curl at the nape of Lysander's neck. This: Lysander standing behind James just a little closer than he should. This: a line and a curve in orbit, doomed to meet only at infinity.)

James doesn't believe much in infinity. So he sits in maths and listens to Lysander breathe and tells himself, pulse hammering, that this is enough. Curving towards, not falling together.


	4. lucy&molly

**molly/lucy sister fic, underground, set by** _ **aebbe**  
_ standalone

* * *

Lucy's gone underground.

Or at least, that's what her friend Carnaby (Carnaby, _honestly_ ) tells Molly when she sweeps into her sister's flat.

"But we're due at lunch," says Molly, and then, "wait, like, literally underground?"

Carnaby's stare is much more patronising than Molly thinks is fair, considering he's called Carnaby. "No, _obviously_. Underground, to earth, etcetera."

Molly looks at him blankly. Carnaby sighs and says, "She's looking into the Ministry. Alien cover-ups. You can find her at this address. Don't let anyone see you going in."

If she's being entirely truthful, Molly is getting sick of this whole conspiracy theory thing. It's funny when Dad's around to be wound up by it, but when it's standing in the way of her having lunch and a good sisterly catch-up then she's so over it.

She finds the "underground" (a basement in Clapham full of nerds and photographs of UFO sightings) and, of course, Lucy's in the middle of it with her glasses slipping down her nose and her long hair pulled back into a ponytail. Molly goes over and tweaks the ponytail. It takes Lucy's eyes a second to focus on a person rather than the floorplan in front of her.

"Oh," she exclaims once she's identified Molly, "hey! What are you doing here?"

Molly folds her arms. "Lunch. Are you really wearing that top?"

"It's cool, fuck off." Lucy hoists her jeans up and reaches for her jacket. "Where are we going?"

"Blue Elephant."

"Ooh, Thai, nice."

"Hector set up a tab for me."

"You slut."

"Hey, I didn't sleep with him. Yet. Much. Mostly it's the promise of things to come that's got him so keen to treat me right."

Almost all of Lucy's co-conspirators have turned to watch them leave. Tall, red-headed, Lucy in her bomber jacket and Molly in heels so high she's got an extra three inches on her sister. Molly gives a particularly greasy-looking one a flirty wave. Lucy slides her a half-glare, but doesn't say anything.

"Just so you know," Molly remarks as they emerge back out into daylight, "there are like six Ministry cars parked round the corner. Pretty sure they've got that whole place bugged."

Lucy turns a familiar, wicked smile on Molly and slips a small black device down her sister's top. "Don't worry. I've got the only thing worth having. Keep it secret for me?"

Molly doesn't even hesitate. She readjusts her bra so whatever it is lies flat between her boobs and promises, "Always."


End file.
